MEDRADSC 2F03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Bremsstrahlung, Emission Spectrum, Photon

• School: McMaster University
• Department: Medical Radiation Sciences
• Course: MEDRADSC 2F03
• Professor: Lumsden

Document Summary

If one could stand i the middle of the useful x-ray beam and catch every single x-ray and measure the energy of it, one could describe what is known as the x-ray emission spectrum. Characteristic x-ray emission spectrum: a plot of the frequency with which characteristic x-rays are emitted as a function of their energy would look similar to this: Even though there are 5 k x-rays, it is customary to represent them as one with a single line like this: When an x-ray tube is operated at 90 kvp, bremsstrahlung x-rays with energies up to 90 kev are emitted. A typical bremsstrahlung x-ray emission spectrum looks like this: The general shape of the bremsstrahlung x-ray spectrum is the same for all x- ray imaging systems. The maximum energy of a bremsstrahlung x-ray is equal to the kvp of operation.